“Over the coming weeks, Lanzarote will be filled with the best cinema from all over the world. Those who live here will have the chance to meet many of the women and men who directed these films, and they will be able to attend more than 70 activities concocted for all ages, and organised in every municipality, including hikes, workshops, courses, talks and meet-ups.” This is how the 15th edition of the Lanzarote Film Festival, an event organised by the independent body Tenique Cultural and headed up by Javier Fuentes Feo, has been officially introduced. The event will take place on the Canary Island from 20-30 November.

On this occasion, the theme chosen for its Trasfoco section is none other than water, the very element that surrounds the island of Lanzarote. Furthermore, as the festival notes, “The history of cinema is brimming with the presence of water: mists, rain, clouds, fog, rivers, waterfalls, snow, ice, puddles, lakes, dams, fountains, streams… But, likewise, it has also been replete with the absence of water: droughts, deserts, parched wells, wars, rationing.” Thus, this strand of the festival will screen titles such as Stalker by Andrei Tarkovsky, Water, Wind, Dust by Amir Naderi, and Toula or the Water Spirit by duo Moustapha Alassane and Anna Soehring. What's more, Trasfoco en Municipios will take movies such as Spain's Even the Rain [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Icíar Bollaín
scheda film] by Icíar Bollaín, Chile's Secas – Defensoras de las aguas by Galut Alarcón and the US title A Civil Action by Steven Zaillian, among others, across the island.

Meanwhile, the line-up of its exquisite Official Section comprises The Shards [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Masha Chernaya
scheda film] (Georgia/Germany) by Masha Chernaya, which won at Doclisboa 2024; the Palestinian-German-French-Qatari co-production With Hasan in Gaza [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Kamal Aljafari
scheda film], directed, written, shot and edited by Kamal Aljafari, which took part in the latest Locarno Film Festival; Kontinental 25 [+leggi anche:
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scheda film] by Romanian maestro Radu Jude, shot entirely on an iPhone and rewarded at the most recent Berlinale; the German film Conference of the Birds [+leggi anche:
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scheda film], the debut feature by Amin Motallebzadeh, which screened at FIDMarseille earlier this year; the Colombian picture Forensics, by Federico Atehortúa, winner of the Special Jury Prize in Karlovy Vary’s Proxima section; and the Chilean title Carta a mis padres muertos by Santiago Agüero. In addition, four short films produced on the Canary Islands will make up the Cruce de caminos (lit. "Crossroads") section.

Lastly, it should be noted that this year, the venue chosen to receive the Lanzarote Film Festival’s Honorary Award is the Eden Theatre in the French city of La Ciotat, a contemporary of the Eiffel Tower and the site of the first screenings by the Lumière brothers. It has remained open as a cinema ever since; today, it programmes 25 screenings a week and welcomes several thousand visitors a month, who seek to experience the particular atmosphere of this storied theatre, with its two large galleries and its flavour of times past. The award will be collected by Michel Cornille, president of the Les Lumières de l’Eden association, dedicated to ensuring the upkeep and preservation of the venue, and director of the oldest operating cinema in the world.